Overall anglers appear to be happy with the quantity, quality and size of fish available to be caught this winter and so they should be. It doesn’t seem to matter where one fishes there are plenty of fish hanging around waiting to be caught. The Te Wairoa Stream has some very large fish holding off the mouth, admittedly well out of even the longest caster of the fly but they are there. Good quality rainbows in excess of four kilos are holding in reasonably close and those who are using an intermediate line and woolly bugger stand a better chance than those who don’t during the day. The Landing also has plenty of fish moving along and over the weed beds during the day, which can be caught using an olive woolly bugger and intermediate line also. For those not having such a slow sinking line the use of a split shot or weighted nymph can achieve the same result. Casting along the outside edge of the weed bed is best if possible.
Boyes beach has some pretty impressive fish as well as does the stream mouth to the left of the beach. Grey ghost, woolly bugger on a floating line during the day should bring a positive result. For those into spin fishing the use of a brown trout tassie devil will also take fish.
A few fish have been coming off the main road beach at Blue Lake. Most seem to be just under the two kilo mark but there are bigger specimens cruising around. A floating or intermediate fly line is best when there isn’t too much wind from any direction apart from behind. Spin fishing should be successful around this lake, where there is access. Any lure with a lot of action should be a winner as rainbows are very aggressive at this time of the year.
School Arm at Lake Rerewhakaaitu is still providing great fishing for most. As fish are looking for a suitable spawning area they will be following the contour of the lake edge and so can be picked off as they round the edge of any reed bed, heading for the shore. Black woolly buggers seem to be catching well, though any smelt pattern, when cast close to the edge of a reed bed, will catch fish.
Lake Okaro and Ngapouri have both been a little slow over the past week, in comparison to other lakes in our area but they are both worth persevering with, especially if you are in the area. Catch rates on the upper Ngongotaha Stream have been reasonably good, though there are a lot of smaller as well as spent rainbows there at the moment. The brown trout are large and in good condition, though they require a fair amount of stealth and luck to be able to get a cast to, let alone land. Change of light at either end of the day or after dark is a better option when targeting brown trout in this stream.
Okere Falls Arm has produced some great tales, if not fish, of the ones that got away. There are really large rainbows spawning there at the moment but they are getting harder and harder to tempt. There are large rainbows and plenty of them, spawning just above the gates but they are in a very challenging st to fish and are not overly interested. With the control gates wide open as part of the control gates mitigation/resource consent, fishing has become a little harder. There is a strong flow down the arm but not a lot of water. Lake Rotoiti is expected to drop around 100 mm which should increase the flow of water through the Ohau Channel. The idea is to increase the flow through there to flush some of the silt that has built up along the wall down the Kaituna. So far there has been no change in the water quality of the Kaituna but I would expect that to change as time goes by. Be aware that the area above the control gates closes to fishing from June 30 until October 1 2012. There is a limit of eight fish per day above the gates. The area below the control gates is open all year and has a limit of two fish per day.
Reasonable numbers of rainbows and browns continue to move into the Ngongotaha Stream, even with the lack of rain over the past few days. The next rain event will bring more fish into the stream, though the number of browns is likely to decrease from the end of this month.
The Waiteti Stream will also improve with rain and large runs of rainbows can be expected then.
